Paediatric Adaptive Sepsis Platform Trial (PASSPORT)

A/Prof Elliot Long – Royal Children’s Hospital

Australian Clinical Trials Alliance (ACTA) interviewed A/Prof Elliot Long on his study, Paediatric Adaptive Sepsis Platform Trial (PASSPORT) – an adaptive platform trial out of the PREDICT Clinical Trial Network (ACTA member). The study is currently in the stage of applying for funding after six months of planning.

ACTA has developed this case study to understand the impact of ACTA’s work on early-stage adaptive platform trial researchers. A/Prof Elliot Long was interviewed on how ACTA has helped his study after presenting his work at ACTA’s Adaptive Platform Trials Workshop in November 2022 (held as part of ACTA’s Annual Scientific Meeting). As part of the workshop, he received expert panel feedback around data management, ethics approval including operational aspects. The workshop also provided networking and collaborative opportunities with both panel members and other similar groups; and he is now collaborating with international groups to expand this study. A/Prof Long’s understanding of innovative trial designs has improved and he has gained confidence and knowledge regarding the future use of innovative trial designs.

A/Prof Long credited ACTA with the production of valuable and trustworthy resources that he has used and would certainly use again. The opportunities to identify groups at a similar stage of planning, and further, the ability to engage with future international partner sites was viewed very positively. Overall, he considered that ACTA contributed to increasing awareness, understanding of innovative trial designs in a very practical way.

‘Conducting trials in sepsis has been difficult to do in a traditional way. As a result, securing participants was difficult. Doing an APT gave a chance to shift the dial and seemed to be the best way to answer our questions and implement change.’

‘The network has never done this before, so there is no precedent or roadmap, no steps to date. We were unsure about where to involve the core steering group, participants, sites etc. It has been helpful to have expertise from ACTA in this area.’